Tag Archives: Zombie Death Quota

If I’m going ahead and making grand assumptions1 here, I’m going to assume that the ‘R’ in Death Quota R ($1.00) almost certainly stands for Robots, as they are your main antagonist in the game. Which is a nice break from the usual zombie menace that developer Edelica Digital Bros. goes to whenever a new Death Quota must be met. Evidently, that quota is about to be reached, as this game represents the developer’s last project on XBLIG.

This also marks the third title in the series, an FPS buried under a Minecraftian layer of blocks. Yet you shouldn’t assume that you’ll be doing any crafting or remodeling here; the ‘levels’ in Death Quota R boil down to, more or less, collect-athons. Each stage finds you— or with a friend in local co-op— gathering a certain number of ‘powercores’, dodging flying drones and mowing down robotic patrols as you go (past games in the series had a similar objective). Once you’ve secured the amount that stage requires, a helicopter is summoned and sent for your extraction.

The entirely of this race to collect things takes place on a medium-sized island, teeming with alien structures and dark interiors, serene beachfront property, and… trees. Lots of trees. It’s also really familiar. Edelica has been getting quite the mileage out of that solitary map, as it’s been more or less the same since ZDQ 2 and the original Zombie Death Quota. Regardless of that familiarity, the map handles the task of hiding the powercores you seek in some out-of-the-way places without being overly annoying about it.

Combat remains as solid as ever. Besides your trusty, infinite-ammo-having handgun, you’ll have a handful of standard weapon types to switch up the killing (the loadout changes slightly for each stage), as well as scattered crates that appear periodically and / or get dropped from defeated enemies, netting you additional ammo, health kits, and powercores. If you tire of the short campaign (six levels), there’s always online battles for up to six players.

That multiplayer will be hit and (mostly) miss, however, as XBLIG is perpetually vacant in its online lobbies. That leaves you with the single-player campaign, which gets highly repetitive after the first couple stages of collecting, and collecting, and collecting. Sometimes you collect more, sometimes less. The robotic sentries, too, will gradually get on your nerves, with their constant teleporting and shielding (more like taunting, the metal bastards).

It’s hard to shake the feeling of familiarity. The game looks great and handles just as well, but Death Quota R is really just more of the same idea already realized, under a semi-new coat of paint. Newcomers to the series will probably appreciate it for what it does, but if you’ve played a Death Quota game before this, don’t expect much refinement in Edelica’s XBLIG denouement.

‘Grand assumptions’ account for like, 85% of the decision-making in my life. You can probably guess how well that’s worked out for me. ↩

Although they’ve long passed the threshold for burnout and outstayed their comeback, you just can’t keep the Zombies down. Not even with a headshot. They’ve come in all shapes and sizes, all manner of decay and speed. As the whole story, or as the backdrop for a larger one. In novels, in movies, and in video game form. And certainly combined with Minecraft. Though like many others before it, the Minecraftian look in ZDQ II Ghost Dogs ($1.00) is merely there as a means to an end; to get you to mow down a bunch of block-headed zombies.

I wouldn’t call it a full-fledged sequel to Zombie Death Quota, either; more an update to take advantage of Activision’s most recent Call of Duty title. While dogs play a large role in that game (often as allies), the canines in ZDQ II are anything but your furred friends, relegated to a spirit form that will occasionally spawn to attack you. Hence the title. Inspired stuff. What is new for this game is the two-player offline co-op.

Which helps to alleviate an otherwise-identical zombie wave shooter setup. As large parts of this game are carried over from the original, you’ll find yourself on a pretty familiar island map, using the same HUD and weapons. Your objectives remain the same as well; killing a set number of zombies, and collecting a few crates that are scattered around the level, after which you wait for extraction and advance. The ‘quotas’ for completion vary, as does your loadout. A fogged-over version of the map is also used in rotation, mimicking the settings from the first.

Not your best friend. Not at all.

Rampant déjà vu aside, the game still features excellent controls and enough variety that you don’t necessarily feel locked into the same cycle each playthrough. Enemies are crafty and quick, meaning you’ll have to pay attention and use the environment to your advantage. The level itself has plenty of terrain, alternating from the high ground to beaches, interiors and caves. The guns feel different from each other, and are satisfying to use (you also get a brief infusion of Dubstep whenever you roast an enemy with the flamethrower).

It all comes down to how many zombies you can stomach. If you haven’t played the original, then ZDQ II Ghost Dogs is certainly the version to buy. For everyone else that has, and is already suffering from undead fatigue, the lack of new content here might make this version of the game a trifle bit unnecessary.